Forum:Information Confirming Procedures Revisions?
I'm continually being inquired whenever I add information from a background/stunt/uncredited performer's role to this page and keep being told to either ignore IMDb or contact the performer via phone/email. First of all, I don't see how this will work when there's not much else to go on and, secondly, the performers don't always reply nor do they check their emails due to their busy schedules, etc. I'm also being told now that a performer's resume also isn't a reliable source and I would like to know why that is. --Gunman6 (talk) 19:25, January 27, 2014 (UTC) :I've told you why that is, time and time again. I've shown you examples many times of imdb listing wrong information, of performers' resumes saying they doubled for people and then it turning out that they were never needed. There's no context, no confirmation that they ever appeared on the show. If I list 24 on my personal website, can we add my name to the credits without bothering to even check an episode? :No-one is saying to ignore imdb - but you cannot use it as a primary source of information. No-one is saying you have to contact a performer by phone or e-mail - that is just one way to confirm a role. But performers' websites are not verified sources of information.--Acer4666 (talk) 19:32, January 27, 2014 (UTC) ::Professionals don't just add material to their resumes. This sounds like speculation.--Gunman6 (talk) 06:43, January 28, 2014 (UTC) :::Yes, your first sentence there, "Professionals don't just add material to their resumes", is speculation--Acer4666 (talk) 12:28, January 28, 2014 (UTC) ::::Doesn't change the fact that it's speculative or an assumption to believe that someone's personal resume is wrong. Again, I'll ask how do we confirm that someone played a particular role if they don't respond to a PM or their email bounces?--Gunman6 (talk) 06:37, January 29, 2014 (UTC) :What? I'm saying it might be wrong because we have no confirmation. That's not speculation, it's common sense. :I feel like I'm beating my head against the wall here because I've had this discussion with you already many times. Here goes nothing, but I'll say it all over again for the hell of it: :#John D Ross lists on his resume that he doubled for Omid Abtahi in Season 4. I contacted him by e-mail to find out that Abtahi was confident doing it himself, so Ross never appeared on camera and just provided stunt pads. :#Reuben Langdon lists that he doubled for Gideon Emery in Season 6. Again I contacted him, and he said that they filmed some footage of him falling over in the role, but after he reviewed the episode he said his take never appeared on screen. :#Caryn Mower listed that she doubled for Katee Sackhoff and you added that to the wiki, then I contacted her and she said she also never appeared on camera in the role. You know this because we discussed it, at length, then. :There you go, I'm not speculating, there's three examples where had we just blindly added them we would have been wrong. I don't see why you're making me repeat this argument again and again but it's really getting tiresome. If someone doesn't respond to a PM or e-mail you can't think "Oh well, I tried, let's just guess now". There are some roles we will never confirm if people don't respond to e-mails - but that's just the way it is.--Acer4666 (talk) 10:10, January 29, 2014 (UTC) ::Well, it seems rather heavy-handed as there are plenty of roles for which educated guesses were made, most notably various roles for J.J. Perry and John Meier, some of which were agreed upon and others which were just simple guesses without any email confirmation. Speaking of Meier, he, Jalil Jay Lynch and Jeff Cadiente also can't confirm everything they do so again, using only email to confirm seems like a cop-out. If we find out later that they were there on-set but didn't double like their resumes suggest, we could easily edit and fix that problem.--Gunman6 (talk) 16:40, January 29, 2014 (UTC) :::We don't list unconfirmed or wrong info with a view to changing it sometime later. The roles you're talking about with JJ Perry and John Meier were made based on visual identification of people in the episodes. With people doubling for actors this is nearly always impossible to do.--Acer4666 (talk) 16:49, January 29, 2014 (UTC) ::::Surely, there must be some other way though besides visual confirmation though.--Gunman6 (talk) 20:33, January 29, 2014 (UTC) ::::: I wish Acer was wrong, it would make things much simpler, but he's right. Personally (especially years back when I did most of my edits) I've been responsible for posting an uncomfortable amount of factual errors here, based on resumes and uncertain visual identifications. But the standard for posting stuff has improved greatly since my early days, and has increasingly involved a lot of outreach to the performers themselves. I've only done outreach a few dozen times; but Acer and you guys have been making an art of it, which is fantastic. ::::: In the end, the best course of action is to use Talk/Forum/User space to post stuff you're unsure about, drum up a discussion, try to get response from the performer/crew/etc., and get a consensus. It takes time, and results in dead-ends sometimes, but it is superior to posting material that isn't as verified as it could be. 00:59, February 5, 2014 (UTC)